


won't forget, can't regret (what i did for love)

by stardustandswimmingpools



Series: newsies modern high school!au [1]
Category: Newsies - All Media Types, Newsies!: the Musical - Fierstein/Menken
Genre: (i have also never been kissed. this fic is a bigass lie), Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Boys Kissing, Gay, Getting Together, IT'S GAY, JUST, M/M, Modern Era, Sharing a Bed, Violence, and that word is fuck, anyway, attempts to write dialogue in the style of 1900s newsies, because i know one italian word, but keep in mind that i have never been in a fight, emotionally repressed assholes, failure to write dialogue in the style of 1900s newsies, it works as a standalone okay, it's a thing okay, it's somewhat graphic, oh uh, part of a way bigger universe that is still, race goes to school in manhattan with the gang, race is italian, slowly being pieced together, so it's probably all just Lies, so you should read it, sorta - Freeform, spot goes to school in brooklyn, there's a dog, they're fifteen, they're friends because they play against each other in baseball, uh, which means there is one italian word, why are they both so DUMB
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-01
Updated: 2017-05-01
Packaged: 2018-10-25 02:55:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,690
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10755270
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stardustandswimmingpools/pseuds/stardustandswimmingpools
Summary: Spot has to stop fighting Race's fights for him.





	won't forget, can't regret (what i did for love)

**Author's Note:**

> relevant and important notes for once!! please read them.
> 
> Okay, first of all: this fic is actually one short fic in an au that i'm slowly building with my tumblr friend @doodleddaisies and the concept of this fic is almost entirely thanks to her, so there's that. realistically, we may never complete the au. it's just a bunch of fics.  
> THAT SAID, this fic can stand alone.  
> THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW:  
> 1) race, crutchie, and jack are adoptive brothers, adopted by medda (crutchie and jack aren't in this but)  
> 2) they have a dog. his name is Hobbes (yes, after the cartoon stuffed tiger. CRUTCHIE NAMED IT AND THAT'S THE KIND OF PERSON CRUTCHIE IS OKAY)  
> 3) i have never been in a fight and i suck at writing fight scenes so i'm deeply sorry about the beginning of this, i know it's unrealistic, let it slide ok  
> 4) they're sophomores in high school (it's a whole Thing just go with it) but race goes to school in manhattan w the other newsies and spot goes to school in brooklyn (i also said this in the tags but it doesn't hurt to mention it again)  
> the title is from A Chorus Line's _What I Did For Love_ and also please listen to that musical, it's extraordinary  
>  and that's all!! anyway enjoy this please i'm proud of it and.....it's cute ok cool

Spot prides himself on his ability to completely detach from everything and everyone. Don't get attached, stop caring, don't get hurt. Easy philosophy.

Until stupid fucking Racetrack Higgins strode into his life and defiantly stuck a flag into Spot’s foundation, cracking it.

As much as he’ll deny it, and as much as he hates it, he does care about Race — actually, worse, he _loves_ Race, and that is just about the scariest and dumbest stunt he’s ever pulled.

Especially because Race is just such a dumbass.

And that leaves Spot to run into the parking lot on his way to Race’s house — the parking lot that’s been abandoned and rotting for as long as time has existed, the one where two skinny boys are leering at one shorter boy that is suspiciously Race-shaped — and shove him out of the way and take a blow to his chin for him, because Race is a dumbass and Spot loves him anyway.

“Spot!” It’s an exclamation filled with confusion, worry, surprise.

The blow in question has come from a fist connected to an arm connected to a very slender body that has a hell of a right hook, and there’s another guy next to him with the same skinny but looming body. Spot recognizes them by the way they match up with Race’s description of the two dickwads at his school that always give him shit. Some kids named Morris and Oscar Delancey, notoriously assholes and always looking for a fight. They even wear matching Cheshire grins of malice.

But it’s Race who yanks Spot away from where Morris’s fist now smacks dead air.

Race _can’t_ fight. Okay, he can, but Spot isn't about to let him.

“What are you doing here?” Race hisses.

“Yeah, where’d your _boyfriend_ come from?” Oscar taunts, advancing on Spot and Race. He's followed by Morris.

Oh, yeah, Spot has no reason to be in Manhattan, not when he lives in Brooklyn and his school is in Brooklyn and his life is in Brooklyn.

But Race is in Manhattan, and Spot figured paying a casual visit every once in awhile can’t hurt.

Apparently he was wrong.

Just for the weak attempt at an insult, Spot lunges forward and decks Oscar in the jaw. Oscar retaliates by jerking his head until it connects with Spot’s, which gives Spot a splitting headache and probably a bruise.

But no one gets to win in a fight against Spot Conlon.

Especially not when they're advancing like that on Race.

Spot kicks into Oscar’s stomach, sending him stumbling backwards, and then whirls around and lands a punch on Morris’s ugly face just as the guy opens his mouth — probably to spit some other brainless insult. His teeth dig into Spot’s knuckles and Spot sucks in a breath.

Before he can register that he's bleeding, hands topple him over and he’s on the ground, and Oscar is standing over him, looking royally pissed.

“Came to fight your boy’s battles, huh?” Oscar snickers. “Good job.”

He can hear someone grunt but if he turns his head Oscar will beat the shit out of him. Spot decides to take pride in the shiner blossoming on the guy’s jaw. Race — apparently he’d come out victorious with Morris — shoves Oscar with a muttered, “Fucking hell, Conlon,” and Spot scrambles to his feet, glaring around himself.

“Don't shove my brother, asshole,” Morris sneers, but Race swings his fist around and Spot _hears_ where it makes contact with Morris’s forehead. Race swears loudly and in Italian.

Things turn into a bit of a blur after that, but Spot significantly recalls being a little pissed off at Race, because fighting is usually cathartic, but he can't stop worrying about stupid Race and _is he being hit and where's Morris is he about to get Race I can't let that happen_.

If there's one thing Spot Conlon can do, it's throw a solid punch. Unfortunately, it looks like the Delanceys have picked up the same ability. Spot feels his face sting with heat and the many places he's probably bleeding and bruising. As Oscar’s fist meets Spot’s mouth, he tastes blood, which jolts him to reality. His lip is busted. Shit.

Spot is the last person to back down from a fight, but —

Race.

Race is pretty much at odds with Morris, but Spot elbows the sucker in the neck and he trips backwards. Spot grabs Race’s hand, which really hurts _his_ hand because he’s sore and bleeding and potentially has broken his fingers, and yanks him away, fixing Oscar with a chilling glare.

“Yeah, you better run!” Morris yells through a lisp that, Spot thinks with an ounce of satisfaction, is either his or Race’s doing.

Race tries to wrestle out of Spot’s grip, shouting, “Go fuck yourself, Delancey!” But Spot is _not_ letting go, and he doesn’t, not until they're out of that deserted parking lot and they’re standing at a subway station. Spot has only the faintest idea that they’re near Race’s apartment, and he feels sluggish and worn.

“Damn it, Spot, I was fine,” Race snaps, and turns to glare at Spot, when his eyes widen and his mouth falls open a bit. “Holy _shit_.”

“I'm fine,” Spot says quickly. “But your stupid ass has gotta get cleaned up, you're bleeding.”

“I'm — have you _seen_ yourself? Spot, how come you’s even in Manhattan?” Race asks, gritting his teeth.

“Forget about it.” Spot turns to leave and Race’s hand closes around his wrist.

“Like hell I’m lettin’ you go anywhere like that. You’re a fucking mess. Come on.”

“Wh — leggo, Race!” Spot argues, twisting his wrist, and then hisses. “ _Fuck_ , that hurts.”

Race immediately lets go, and Spot considers just running, but Race is looking at him with some kind of expression like… Spot can't disagree.

“Just — come on, Spot.”

“Damn it, fine,” he concedes, shaking his head. “Lead the way.”

 

* * *

 

It’s convenient that Race lives very close to the parking lots in which he chooses to fight people. They walk in silence, and Spot can feel the tension brewing, knows that Race is angry at him for interfering, knows he's angry at Race for starting a fight he could've ended without a pulse.

Despite this, when the enter the eerily empty apartment (save for Hobbes, who barks three times before reluctantly approaching Spot to sniff him), Race commands Spot to sit in a dining room chair and emerges from the kitchen with a wet wash cloth.

“No way,” Spot starts to argue, but Race glares at him. “You’re bleedin’, Race!”

“An’ you're bleedin’ more!” Race counters.

“I don't need you to clean me up, Race, I ain't a toddler,” Spot mutters.

Race ignores him and tugs Spot’s hands toward him. “Jesus _Christ_ , Spot, I don't need you to fight all my fights for me. I woulda been fine, alright? I was takin’ care of it.”

“You woulda died, asshole!” Spot snaps, and then bites his lip and squeezes his eyes shut as Race cleans off his knuckles with a surprising gentleness. “Shit, Race, how come you get yourself into — into fights and make a mess o’ yourself?”

Race deigns not to answer, which is surprising. Spot keeps going, exhaling all of the worry that has consumed him for the past twenty minutes. He rubs Hobbes’s stomach with the side of his foot. The dog sits, complacent, beside the chair Spot occupies.

“You seriously would've died, Race. Or got your ass kicked to the Brooklyn Bridge. What were you thinkin’, taking on them boys? They’s ugly as hell but they can damn well fight, and I know you ain't as stupid as you sometimes act, so you gotta have known they wasn't no one to mess with. _Racetrack Higgins,_ ” Spot says loudly, sharply, tearing Race’s attention away from his knuckles and meeting his eyes, “what the _hell?_ ”

Maybe he sounds too desperate for answers, or maybe he's just tired and delirious and in too much pain to try and act like he doesn't care about Race. Maybe he’s testing his friend. Hobbes whines.

Race snaps. “And what do you care, huh? You hate me.” To Spot’s astonished expression: “Don't play dumb, I ain't as stupid as I act, you said it. You’s a big talker about how you don't care about no one an’ you got no one to care about anyway, so answer that, Spot. Why do you care so much? ‘Bout me, and what I get up to? What’s it to you?”

Spot’s just too tired for this; riddled with exhaustion, his face and hands aching just as much as his heart, Race challenging him and still (probably inadvertently) holding his hands even though he’s stopping cleaning them.

He leans in, crashing their lips together in either the most overdue or the most desperate kiss ever — maybe both. It's reassuring when Race doesn't pull back immediately or smack him. It's also satisfying to hear Race sigh into his mouth. Just as Spot leans in more, almost starving for more of _this_ , Race steps back, his hands still holding Spot’s. Spot wonders vaguely if he realizes this.

“Sorry,” Spot mumbles immediately, uncertain if that was a good or a bad development, because Race had definitely kissed him back, but now he's looking like he regrets it.

“Nothin’ to be sorry for,” Race says quietly, and then, “I’m gonna go find an ace bandage.”

Spot feels about as crushed as if he’d been stepped on — but Race, in the doorway, turns around and says, “Don’t...don't leave, yeah?” And there’s this look in his eyes.

Spot swallows. “Yeah.”

 

* * *

 

Race wraps Spot’s hands with a kind of reverence that Spot’s never seen in the boy before, handles him the way Jack handles his artwork, like it'll break if he holds it too tight, but also like he respects it. It makes Spot feel weird.

Race doesn't talk so much now: it looks like he's also weary, all tightness siphoned off of him until all that's left is a tired fifteen-year-old. He wordlessly directs Spot to the bathroom and tells him to sit on the edge of the sink, and Spot obliges. His legs dangle over the edge but don’t reach the floor, which makes him feel ungrounded, unsettled; like his feet can’t even find a flat surface on which to stand. Hobbes follows, settling comfortably on the tile floor of the bathroom. He's almost like a talisman.

It’s even harder to repress the urge to kiss Race when his face is so close like that and he’s so intently focused on cleaning up all of Spot’s (myriad) cuts and bruises, his blue eyes wide with concentration and concern, but Spot’s insides are already churning like he fucked everything up, and there’s no way he’s risking that again.

This is what happens when you show emotion.

What he really wants is for Race to let him _leave_. He’ll go home to Brooklyn and sleep in his mistakes and his bed and when he wakes up he’ll pretend like it never happened and Race will too. They’ll go on. They’ll have to.

Race has never done the thing Spot wants him to.

After ten minutes of being thoroughly put back together, Race steps back with finality. “Okay.” Hobbes, sensing the definitive tone in a way only dogs can, gets to his feet with a noncommittal _woof._

Spot tilts his head. “Whaddaya mean, ‘okay’?”

“I mean you’re — probably okay now,” Race says.

Spot sighs. He slides off the sink, and when his feet touch the ground he feels some kind of order return to his mind. He ruffles Hobbes’s head. “Great. I’m leavin’, then.”

Race frowns. “No you’re not.”

Spot pauses. “I’m — why not?”

“You can’t go all the way back to Brooklyn like that, it’s too late and you’s still all beat up,” Race says seriously, and Spot huffs.

“I’m _fine_ ,” he says.

Race, it seems, has already decided the opposite. “You _ain’t_ , an’ if you think I’m lettin’ you go out at midnight to take the hour-long ride back to Brooklyn — _especially_ seein’ as how you’ll hafta walk quite a lot and you ain’t in no position to be walkin’ a lot — you got another thing comin’. You’re sleepin’ here tonight.”

Spot glares at him. Race glares back.

Spot rolls his eyes. “Fine. Goddamn, you’re stubborn.”

Race actually smiles a little. “I’ll make up the couch. You can take my bed.”

Spot allows himself a moment to soak in the feeling of Race smiling at him despite everything while Race and Hobbes leave, and then the words register.

“Hold up,” he shouts, and rushes out of the bathroom as Race is rummaging in a closet. The boy turns to look at him with a very tired expression.

_“What_ , Spot?”

“I ain’t takin’ your bed,” Spot says fiercely. “No way. You take your bed. If you’s gonna force me to sleep here, I refuse to be a burden.”

Race blinks and his eyes soften and Spot wonders what he said that made Race’s face do that, but then it’s gone and Race replies, “You’re sleeping in my bed an’ that’s the end of it, capische?”

“ _Not_ capische!” Spot’s not sure what _capische_ means, but he disagrees with it. “Race, I swear to god I will stay up all night just so I don’t hafta take your bed.”

Race inhales deeply and then breathes out, eyes closed, which reminds Spot oddly of a mother who’s fed up with her kids. Spot doesn’t know how to feel about that, so he ignores it.

“We’ll share it, then,” Race finally decides.

Spot’s pretty sure he misheard. “The — the bed?”

Race rolls his eyes. “The last cookie. _Yes_ , the bed, genius.”

Spot sighs. “If that’s what it takes.”

He’s not sure he can actually survive a night sleeping in the same bed as Race, but it looks like he doesn’t have a choice.

Race closes the closet door and directs both of them to his bedroom, and it’s weird — Spot has been in their apartment before, but he still feels like he needs Race to tell him where to go, or else he’ll get lost. It’s not even a big apartment, and Spot hates how weak and pathetic he feels right now. Hobbes trots behind, faithful as ever or maybe just a very people-oriented dog.

“What time’s it?” he asks, to fill the silence in Race’s room as he sits on the edge of the bed and Hobbes makes himself at home at Spot’s feet. Race opens his own closet and pulls out an extra pillow from the top. There’s a clock on Race’s bedside table, but Spot doesn’t check it.

“Uh — ‘bout midnight, I think.” Race is too short for the top shelf, and with a grunt, the pillow topples out of the closet onto his head. Spot snorts and feels better — this is normal, this is him laughing at Race for being a dumbass, this is allowed.

Race rolls his eyes, a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth, and tosses the pillow straight to Spot’s chest. Spot catches it and puts it down next to the one that’s already there. The pillows are wrapped in matching blue flannel pillowcases.

Maybe he’s drunk off tiredness. He feels like he’s run a marathon. He could fall asleep right now, sitting down.

His eyes are actually closing when something soft hits his chest, and he opens his eyes to see a t-shirt in his hands.

He looks up at Race, confused.

“Put it on, dumbass,” Race says. “You’re all dirty and gross. No way you’re gettin’ my bed covered in schmutz.”

“Did you just say _schmutz_?” Spot says incredulously.

Race halts. “I mighta.”

“You’s spendin’ too much time with Davey.” Spot pulls his t-shirt over his head and lets it fall to the floor beside the dog before tugging Race’s shirt on in its place. It’s soft and grey and plain and boring and it still makes Spot kind of crazy.

He’s seen Race _wear_ this before. He is wearing a shirt that Race has worn before.

Feelings are the _worst_.

Race, who somehow must have magically changed into an oversized t-shirt when Spot wasn’t paying attention, clambers into bed without a second thought, his head collapsing on the pillow with a soft sigh. Spot deliberates, and then gets up, flicks off the lights, lifts up the other side of the blanket, and puts his own head on the other pillow, facing Race.

“I think you’re forgettin’ somethin’,” Race says in a whisper.

Spot knits his brow. “Somethin’ about what?”

“About thankin’ me. For cleanin’ you up, and all.”

Spot scoffs. “I didn’t need you to clean me up. I woulda been fine. You oughta be thankin’ _me,_ for savin’ your ass in front of the Delanceys.”

“Spot.”

Spot refocuses on Race’s face. He rolls his eyes.

“Okay, alright. Thanks. For playin’ house with me and kindly bein’ the mom.”

Race elbows him and Spot winces, but Race doesn’t see, which is fine.

Everything feels just about normal. It’s almost like they never kissed. And nothing is wrong yet, except for that underlying feeling that everything is going to go wrong. So Spot can fall asleep, wake up, leave, and make like this didn’t happen, like he never got in a fight to save Race’s skin, like he doesn’t _care_ so damn much.

Under the blanket, Spot feels Race lace their hands together loosely. His heart stops.

Neither of them move for awhile — it must be ten years, although really just five minutes — and Spot starts to wonder if Race fell asleep and if he’s going to have to suffer heart trauma from being kept awake by Race’s hand in his, warm through the bandages around his palm.

“Spot?”

Spot blinks. “Hmm?”

There’s a pause. It’s dark, but Spot’s eyes have adjusted, and he can see Race open his mouth and then close it.

“What, Race?”

“Nothin’, never mind.”

“Now you _hafta_ tell me.”

“I don’t hafta do nothing.”

“ _Race_.”

Race sighs. “How come you kissed me?”

Spot kind of wants to be swallowed up by the bed. He’d hoped they could avoid this — never talk about it ever, and never mention it again.

“Why you askin’?” he answers cautiously.

Race looks over at him. “‘Cause it was _me_ you planted a kiss on, genius.”

Spot groans. “Would it help if I said I wish I hadn’t?”

“No.”

_Good, ‘cause that’s not true_ , Spot thinks bitterly. “I ain’t so good with words, okay?”

“Yeah, asshole, I know that.”

“Well, you asked!”

“...You mean you kissed me ‘cause you ain’t good with words?”

Spot sputters. “What was I supposed to say?”

“Anything.”

“You asked me why I cared so much about you gettin’ into fights,” Spot says sharply. “I think if you read between the lines, you can figure out why I kissed you.”

Race looks like he knows, but he also looks like he doesn’t want to say it, which is irritating. “See, I knew you wasn’t as stupid as you act. Go to sleep.”

“You care about me, that’s why,” Race says simply.

Spot sighs. “Sue me.”

“Wow, I ain’t seen the powerful Spot Conlon this emotionally available since ninety-three.”

Spot elbows Race. “You wasn’t even alive in ninety-three.” This conversation isn’t making him feel better about what he did — if anything, it’s worse, because by now Race would have confessed to any feelings he may have had for Spot, which means obviously he _doesn’t_ have feelings for Spot, which, well, doesn’t work wonders for Spot’s self-esteem. The boisterous braggadocio is just an act, and Spot hates that Race knows.

Race grins. “Exactly. I’d hafta go back in time just to see you bein’ real about how you felt about something or someone. No one should needa reach that far.”

“Good for you,” Spot says through clenched teeth. “Can I sleep now?”

He takes the silence as consent, and closes his eyes so he can’t see Race looking beautiful and unattainable and _damn it_.

“I care about you too, y’know.”

He barely hears it in his sleep-heavy state, but when Spot opens his eyes Race is staring — no, _gazing_ at him.

There are lots of things Spot could say. He could rely on the sarcastic exterior that has gotten him this far and say _congratulations_ or _do you want a medal?_ He could be an idiot and say _I love you_ or _please love me_. Or he could say —

“Okay.”

“If I was you and you was me, I woulda kissed you,” Race mumbles.

Spot feels a smile growing on his face.

He blinks, to make sure this is real, to make sure Race is still looking at him the same way. Because things are finally — _finally_ — going right. Yes, this is exactly the way it was always meant to go, the way it was always going to go.

“Nothin’s stoppin’ you,” he says softly.

Race’s eyes widen, and in the space of a million years and one second, he leans in, the same way that Spot remembers leaning in, hungry and bold and urgent.

The second kiss is better and lasts at least ten seconds, until Race squeezes Spot’s hand and Spot winces and pulls away with a hiss.

“Shit, fuck, _cazzo_ ,” Race swears, tugging Spot’s arm over the blanket to check it like it’s broken or something. “Sorry.”

“Race, it doesn’t matter. It’s fine. I’m okay. You cleaned me up nice an’ pretty. I’ll be fine,” Spot says quickly.

Race meets his eyes and then kisses him one more time, soft and slow but altogether too fast.

“Goodnight,” he says, smiling in a half-upturned way that Spot’s never seen, and then, fingers intertwined, he settles down onto his pillow and closes his eyes.

Within moments he’s asleep, breathing deeply. Spot gazes at him for a long minute, decides that making sense of the past events will have to wait for morning, and passes out beside him.

In the morning, Medda finds the boys tangled together under the blanket, Race’s head tucked into the crook of Spot’s neck, and she smiles to herself.

 

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading! you can find me on tumblr @vivilevone or @do-you-ever-really-crash (which is my musicals-but-mostly-DEH-and-newsies blog) and my friend/partner in crime for this fic/series @doodleddaisies there too. cool adios!


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